A common debate among many top digital marketers and when you are an amateur in the world of digital marketing is whether it’s good to invest in SEO or Social Media marketing?
And the word invest is not measured in terms of money only. Rather it’s about the time, labor, importance and planning.
And this is a really important decision to make and understand which is better for you so you are getting the highest returns.
Social Media and SEO, whichever is giving you better returns must be gauged efficiently so you can better manage your energy, money and focus on that more than other tactics that claim to improve your SEO rankings.
Understanding of what exactly SEO and Social Media marketing do for a website will help you better player in the game of digital marketing.
What is the SEO role in digital marketing?
The role of SEO or search engine optimization in digital marketing is very important. SEO actually involves many steps, which are planned according to the science and algorithm of search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo.
And these steps are designed to help sites get more visibility on search engines and ultimately prove the end user with GOOD content. Also, the use of building links to your domain is also a very helpful method for building authority and increasing your domain authority. In the eyes of Google, if authority domains are linking to your content, then it must be credible. That’s why many digital marketers stand by building links. Of course, the proper use of anchor texts and link building campaigns play a huge role in SEO tactics.
So we have concluded that SEO does indeed play a vital part in digital marketing. For beginners, you can usually get started by implementing on-page SEO to start. This can be accomplished easily with plugins like Yoast. There are a lot of tips and SEO tricks you can employ to get higher rankings.
What is Social Media use in digital marketing?
The role of social media marketing for a digital marketer is different than SEO. SEO work deals with how search engines rank and view your site. Social media does play a role in SEO, based on Hootsuite’s experiment there appears to be a strong correlation between social activity and rankings.
But beyond that, it plays a role in branding your website. If you do not have a strong social media following then that may be a red flag. What large company or organization does not regularly post on Facebook or Twitter? I don’t think you can find many.
While having 2,000 Facebook vs 1,500 Facebook fans may not make or break you, it does help you out in the long run. Social proof is a very real thing and your key to magnet marketing. The more followers you have, the more natural engagement you’ll receive on your social media shares and posts which can lead to more traffic for your site. More traffic = more revenue.
If you’re just starting off I’d recommend getting quick traffic through Pinterest. When I start a new website, getting natural organic traffic through Google usually takes six months. Sometimes quicker, but more often than not, most content will receive 80% of its rankings in about six months I’ve found.
If you want quick traffic, you can use this Pinterest guide. In the long term, you’ll want to continue to build content, optimize the posts for SEO, choose long term keywords, and let them sit and wait for them to rank on Google. Also, share your posts on Facebook, Twitter, and other relevant social media platforms.
Bottom Line
You’ll want to employ both tactics, SEO and social media marketing, in your digital media plan. It’s the only path to success.
